Away in a Manger

If there is one scene that seems tell the Christmas story more than any other, it would be Mary and Joseph and their new-born son in the stable.

When we think Nativity, that’s what comes to mind, and I’m sure that many of you have Nativity sets that you have taken out for the Christmas season and now have on display.

We actually have a couple of different nativity sets at home and one of them is usually on display. One I purchased while visiting Sierra Leone and the other one we purchased on a trip to Historic Properties on the Halifax Waterfront.

The one from Sierra Leone is interesting. I bought it at a market, and it is carved out of mahogany. The man who carved it was the man who sold it to me, and he wanted to make sure that I knew what each piece represented. So, as he proudly held up each figure, he told me. This is Joseph, and this is Mary, and here is the baby Jesus. And he continued with the sheep, the shepherd, the three Wisemen and then he stumped me, because he told me the last figure was the horn blower. And sure enough, there was the Hornblower. Silly me, I had somehow missed the Hornblower in the Christmas story.

This is week four or our series, the songs of Christmas. And over the past four weeks we’ve looked at the Christmas story through the lenses of popular Christmas Carols. So, we’ve looked at O Little Town of Bethlehem, O Holy Night, and Go tell it on the mountain. And they have all pointed us to the Nativity scene.

This morning, we are focusing on “Away in a Manger.”

If you had a hymn book with you this morning, and looked up Away in a Manger, you would see that there is no source available for the first two verses, that verse three was written by John McFarland and the music was written by James Murray. But that doesn’t tell all the story.

When the lyrics first appeared in print in in 1882, they were entitled “Luther’s Cradle Song”, and there was a notation that “The following hymn, composed by Martin Luther for his children, is still sung by many of the German mothers to their little ones.”

A year later, something very similar was published in a book entitle “Little Pilgrim Songs” which was a book of Christian music for young children.

The claim of Luther being the author continued into the 1900s, but now is considered to be unfounded, for several reasons.

1. There have been no texts found in Luther’s known writings that corresponds to the carol.
2. There wasn’t a German translation of the carol until 1934, and that seems to be a clunky translation from the English
3. This one I love; the simple narrative style of the song, is so unlike Luther. That he would never give up a chance to teach doctrine and theology in a song.

The third verse has been attributed to both Charles H. Gabriel and Dr. John T. McFarland and the music has been claimed by James R. Murray and Carl Mueller. The reality is that everyone is really just guessing.

And to add to that, when we sing it there are two more names added to it, and those are Chris Tomlin and Ed Cash. And Chris Tomlin hums something and puts his name on it.

What we do know is that Away in a Manger seemed to originate in the US in the late 1800s and has become a favourite around the world.

And it captures the joy and wonder of that first Christmas.

This is what the Bible records Luke 2:6–7 And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. She gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them.

It is interesting that this verse tells us that Mary gave birth to her firstborn son, not her only child but her first child. Seldom do we stop and think about it, but Jesus grew up with siblings; the scriptures tell us that he had brothers and sisters. But I digress, back to story.

This makes a great story, but it is a little odd.

I mean face it, if you were God, master of all things, creator of the universe and all that exists where would you want your child born? A beautiful home? A Palace? A nice hotel? How about a barn? No, probably not a barn. But that was it. The word of God doesn’t actually tell us that he was born in a barn, or even a stable, but it does say that they laid him in a manger. Because most of us are city folks, we aren’t familiar with the term manger, other than at Christmas time or when we spell manager wrong. As a matter of fact, I grew up around horses and barns and I don’t think I ever used the term manger. But because of the Christmas story, we all know what a manger is.

And again, for those who do their bible study off of Christmas cards, we picture this small lonely shed like structure all by itself, surrounded by singing angels and worshipful shepherds. But, hate to burst your bubble, but. . . The bible tells us that the shepherds left their fields and went into Bethlehem.  William Barclay in his commentary on Luke tells us that 2000 years ago there was a structure in many communities called a khan and we are told that historically a khan was like a series of stalls opening off a common courtyard. And so as a part of the historic landscape of Bethlehem, there would be this communal area where travellers could house and care for their animals.

Kind of a . . . parking garage.

But at the heart of this story, we discover humanity divided into two groups, and those two groups exist today, and each one of us belongs to one of those two groups. Don’t you love it when something can be reduced to the very basics? There are not a hundred choices from which we have to choose, not fifty or even twenty or ten. Just two.

And so, the first group we become acquainted with Those who said “No” To Jesus. I suppose there is an honour of sorts to be the first person to reject Christ.

The innkeeper is really the first villain in the story. I mean, what type of person would turn away a pregnant lady who was, as the King James version puts, it was “Great with Child”? That’s the polite way of saying that Mary was a big as a house, or as big as a barn.

We often think of the Inn with a big no vacancy sign flashing in the window, but it wasn’t that there wasn’t room in the inn, that isn’t what the scripture says. let’s read I hi again. Luke 2:6–7 And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. She gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them.

What the Bible tells us is that there was no lodging available, but that there was no lodging available for them. And there is a difference

If we take that to its logical conclusion, the assumption is that there wasn’t room for them but there was room for others.

Perhaps the innkeeper was keeping the room in case he received a better offer. Maybe he knew that as more and more people arrived in Bethlehem for the census that any vacant rooms would become a commodity. You think how pricey even the most modest of rooms would have been in Paris last summer during the Olympics games.

And so perhaps the Innkeeper was just hedging his bets, it wasn’t a personal decision, just an economic one.

And it wasn’t that they were asking for the room for nothing. Again, we often mix up tradition with the actual facts. We have been conditioned from years of Christmas specials and Christmas cards to perceive the home that Christ was born into as one of poverty, and that probably wasn’t the case.

Joseph wasn’t poor, he was a carpenter. A tradesman. He wouldn’t have been wealthy, but I’m sure that he would have been considered middle class in that day and age. I’m sure that when Joseph gathered up Mary and headed for Bethlehem, he probably came prepared. They weren’t looking for charity. But perhaps greed on the innkeeper’s part meant that the room was priced well out of their reach.

And as unfortunate as they may have been, at least it would have simply been a business decision in contrast to the other option.

Maybe he just didn’t want their type there, maybe he has something again people from Nazareth. “Sorry we don’t have room for you people.”

 Were they “You peoples”? Apparently for some folks they were. Do you remember the story found in the first chapter of John’s gospel when the apostles were first gathering around Jesus? The story is found John 1:45–46 Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.” “Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.

So perhaps the innkeeper just didn’t like folks from Nazareth. You might be wondering how he knew where they were from. There is a hint found a lifetime later when Jesus has been arrested, you might recall that Peter is warming himself outside of where Jesus was being questioned and he finds himself being accused of being one of Christ’s followers. A charge he denies, and then we read this Matthew 26:73 A little later some of the other bystanders came over to Peter and said, “You must be one of them; we can tell by your Galilean accent.”

Peter was from the same area as Joseph and Mary, and ultimately Jesus. Never actually think of Jesus having an accent, do we? From the movies, we assume that if Jesus had an accent, it was either British or American. That was what we technically refer to in preaching as a tangent.

Or maybe they just didn’t want a lady who was obviously about to go into labour in one of their rooms, there was the entire plenty of hot water and clean sheets thing, the potential for a mess and not to mention all the screaming that might disturb other guests, transitional labour is nothing to laugh at.

We don’t know why there was no room for them in the inn but we do know is that the innkeeper would not be the last person to reject Christ. And today when Jesus is rejected it’s just like at the inn it’s not because there is no room in the person’s life instead there is no room for Christ in their life.

There’s room for all kinds of things, career, family, habits, ambition and maybe even religion but not for Jesus

And sometimes it’s because a person really doesn’t want to pay the cost, and sometimes they are hoping a better offer will come along and sometimes they are just playing a long shot that they can live like hell and still make it into heaven.

But there were also Those who said “Yes” To Jesus

When we read the Christmas story, we often focus on the fact that there was no room in the inn, however there was room in the stable. And the stable did belong to somebody, and that somebody allowed Mary and Joseph to move in, perhaps just for the night, maybe longer. We don’t know how long they stayed in the stable.

Long enough for Jesus to be born, long enough for the shepherds to visit, but apparently, they moved out before the Magi go there because Matthew tells us in Matthew 2:9–11 After this interview the wise men went their way. And the star they had seen in the east guided them to Bethlehem. It went ahead of them and stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were filled with joy! They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chests and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

And don’t get me started on the entire “the Magi didn’t arrive for two years” thing. That’s just dumb. What reason would Joseph, a carpenter from Nazareth, have to hang around Bethlehem for two years? Seriously?

 You gotta figure that at some point a woman became involved. “You put her where?” “Well, you march yourself right out there and invite them in while I get the spare room ready.”

A couple of things. The offer of the stable would have been commendable if that was all they had. Seriously, if whoever owned it said, “I don’t have room anywhere else but there is the stable.” And they went out and prepared it and cleaned it up and made Mary and Joseph comfortable.

But it would have been a different kettle of fish if they had something better and all they offered was the stable. Would have been a completely different story.

Christ explains the same principle in a very familiar story found in the gospel of, you are familiar with the story, Jesus is standing at the back of the temple next to the offering box and a widow drops in two small coins and we pick up the story in Mark 12:43–44 Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has given more than all the others who are making contributions. For they gave a tiny part of their surplus, but she, poor as she is, has given everything she had to live on.”

It’s the same in our lives the same gift can be given and for one person it is a sacrifice and for another it is just a bauble.

Regardless of why Jesus and his family ended up in the stable it did serve a couple of purposes. And again, it is wise to remember Romans 8:28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.

If you remember the story, the first people invited to come to Jesus were the shepherds, we talked about them last week, and we have to assume that they would have felt a lot more comfortable coming to a stable than coming into an inn or a private home.

“Mort, there are a bunch of shepherds at the door; they say they’re here to see the baby.” And not only that but how inconsiderate would it have been for God to have brought a bunch of shepherds into someone’s house with all of the mess and inconvenience that would have involved.

The shepherds were apparently an important part of the Christmas story, and God made it easy for them to take part.

I think the stable was instrumental in Jesus being accessible to all people. There is something about his humble birth that says He is there for all of us.

Often, not always but often, those born to a privileged life never understand those who are less fortunate than they are, even if their fortune was an accident of birth.

We all remember Marie Antoinette’s comment when she was told that the peasants were upset because they had no bread, “If they have no bread than let them eat cake.” Actually, if you go a little deeper, you discover that when that comment was first reported Marie Antoinette was 10 years old and living in Austria, and while we don’t know for sure who said it historians feel that it was probably Maria Theresa of Spain the wife of King Louise XIV of France. That was free, just another one of those educational services that Cornerstone provides.

And so, Christ began his life not at the top of the economic and social ladder but at the bottom.

It is interesting to note and perhaps to ponder on that Christ began his life born in a stable that belonged to someone else and ended his life buried in a tomb that belonged to someone else. Not always one for inspirational poems and readings but I do love this one.

One Solitary Life, written by Reverend James Allan Francis 1926

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in still another village, where He worked in a carpenter shop until He was 30. Then for three years He was an itinerant preacher. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family or owned a house. He didn’t go to college. He never traveled more than 200 miles from the place He was born. He did none of the things one usually associates with greatness. He had no credentials but Himself. He was only 33 when public opinion turned against Him. His friends deserted Him. He was turned over to His enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves. When He was dying, His executioners gambled for His clothing, the only property He had.. . . on earth. When He was dead, He was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend. Nineteen centuries have come and gone, and today He is the central figure of the human race, the leader of mankind’s progress. All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on earth as much as that One Solitary Life.

Let’s end this morning with a quote from William Barclay who wrote “That there was no room in the inn was symbolic of what was to happen to Jesus. The only place where there was room for him was on a cross. He sought an entry to the over-crowded hearts of men; he could not find it; and still his search–and his rejection–go on.”

And so this Christmas the question is the same as it was on that first Christmas morning over 2000 years ago: Will you make room for Jesus?